Monday, March 30, 2009

I was reading Systematic Theology[1] and something struck me I have never seen before. Gifts of knowledge and gifts of speech are separate. Forgive my slowness, for it seems obvious in retrospect. Someone can have huge understanding, but no teaching ability, or huge teaching ability and no understanding. And unfortunately we tend to equate the two.

Why unfortunately? This leads to problems when we assume that teaching ability is the same as understanding. Who have you learnt most from? It has probably been those with most teaching ability but not necessarily the most wisdom. We learn our understanding of God moderated through the most entertaining preachers (and now bloggers), and get our knowledge of cars and motoring from Jeremy Clarkson. At the risk of invoking Godwin's Law, the supreme example of someone who could teach without wisdom was Adolf Hitler. Or perhaps more controversially Plato (Moron). His arguments are weak enough every first year Philosophy student can find flaws in them, but he does write well.

This led me to a deeper understanding of James 3:1-2. Do pray for those with the gift of teaching. People (including me) will listen and believe almost whatever they teach, and if they lead little ones astray the consequences are severe.